TDSAT Seminar, Shimla-22nd March 2014

On 22 March TDSAT held its seminar on ‘Regulatory Framework and Dispute Resolution in Telecom Broadcasting and ‘Cable Services Sectors’ in New Auditorium, Administrative Block, High Court of H.P at Shimla. These seminars are held regularly throughout the year in different cities of the country and aimed at discussing consumer issues in broadcasting and telecom sectors. The seminars also help to educate young lawyers and local stakeholders in understanding the dispute settlement process in the telecom and broadcasting sector. 

Many eminent judges of High Court were invited to speak on different subjects of judicial system in the country in this seminar.

The Simla Seminar was inaugurated by Hon’ble Justice Mansoor Ahmad Mir, Acting Chief Justice, High Court, Himachal Pradesh who was the chief guest at the event. In his address, he underlined the significance of the TDSAT in settlement of telecom disputes. He said that telecom services are integral part of everyday life and the sector has grown exponentially in the country, with which the telecom disputes have also grown and mediation has a great potential for providing satisfying solutions to disputes.

After the inauguration and lighting of the lamp, Mr Kuldeep Singh, Member, TDSAT delivered the introductory address followed by illuminating address by Mr MF Farooqui, Secretary, Department of Telecom and Dr. Vijayalakshmy K Gupta, Member TDSAT and Hon’ble Justice Mansoor Ahmad Mir. Hon’ble Mr Justice Aftab Alam, Chairperson TDSAT gave the concluding remarks. Vote of thanks was delivered by Mr DP De, Advisor, TDSAT.

Highlight of the seminar was a round table deliberation process between various stakeholders and advocate members of TLA.  This is the first time such an initiative was taken by TDSAT under the supervision of the Chairperson, Sh. Justice Aftab Alam.  Many cable operators and MSOs who had come to attend the seminar from all over Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh and Punjab, had a chance to discuss their problems face to face with eminent lawyers, expert in cable TV and broadcasting matters. Justice Alam also asked COFI president Mrs Roop Sharma to give him an outcome of the deliberations listing out problems in the industry leading to many legal disputes.  Some of these points were also discussed by a panel of experts from the industry after the Round Table. Panelists included Mr Tejveer Bhatia, Mr Nasir Hussain, Mr Jayant Mehta, Mr A Mohan, Mr Kunal Tandon- Advocates and Mr Rohit Vaswani, a mediator. The discussion was moderated by Mr Meet Malhotra, Sr Advocate and Mr Navin Chawla, Advocate. Topics discussed by the panel included- 

(a)Issues in migration, from Analog to Digital, 

(b)RIOs - are they serving their purpose?  

(c)Tariff related issues in DAS regime  

(d)Pre-litigation mediation and other mechanisms in settling disputes

(e)Exchange of signed Agreement as per Law In the concluding session senior executives of Ministry, TRAI and advocates carried out an interactive session with the audience. Mr Manjul Bajpai, President TLA chaired the session and summed up the seminar. The seminar ended with Mr Sanjeev Pandey, Assistant Registrar, TDSAT giving vote of thanks. 

Source: http://cablequest.org/articles/shows-or-launch-events/item/4577-tdsat-seminar,-shimla-22nd-march-2014.html
Source: http://cablequest.org/articles/shows-or-launch-events/item/4577-tdsat-seminar,-shimla-22nd-march-2014.html